Wapiti Ranger Station

A National Historic Landmark. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1966.

From the record

“Wapiti Ranger Station is a ranger station in Shoshone National Forest west of Cody, Wyoming, United States. The station, the oldest in the United States Forest Service, has been used continuously since it was built in 1903.”
Wikipedia article Wapiti Ranger Station, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 38 National Register listings published here for Park County · listed in 1966 · category: Building · a National Historic Landmark.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

Address. Shoshone National Forest, Wapiti, 82414
When was it listed? October 1966
Category. building
Census division. Cody
Architectural style. rustic architecture
National Register reference number. 66000759 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

30 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 30 fires within 5 miles of Wapiti Ranger Station between 1992 and 2020, burning about 553 acres in total. 7 started naturally. 1 was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Recreation and ceremony	10
Natural	7
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	7
Misuse of fire by a minor	2
Fireworks	1
Debris and open burning	1
Arson/incendiarism	1
Equipment and vehicle use	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
24 September 2020	Arson/incendiarism	under an acre	Shoshone National Forest	GRIZZLY
24 September 2002	Natural	under an acre	Shoshone National Forest	BIG BUCK
16 September 1992	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Shoshone National Forest	WAPITI
1 September 2016	Natural	1.0 acres	Shoshone National Forest	CANYON
4 August 2013	Misuse of fire by a minor	under an acre	Wyoming State Forestry	REMINGTON
13 August 1996	Natural	under an acre	Shoshone National Forest	RIFLE
1 August 2013	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Shoshone National Forest	BIG GAME
8 July 2019	Natural	under an acre	Shoshone National Forest	GRIZZLY

Every fire recorded in Park County

Mines and quarries near this property

2 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 2 workings within 5 miles of Wapiti Ranger Station: 1 unknown, 1 occurrence. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Sulfur, Uranium. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Where	Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
	Gail Group	Uranium	Occurrence
	Sweetwater Creek	Sulfur	Unknown

Every working recorded in Park County

Storms near this property

9 since 2001

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Wapiti, the town this property stands in, in 9 storm reports between 2001 and 2026: 4 thunderstorm wind, 3 wildfire, 1 flood, 1 lightning. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
June 2010	Lightning	Wapiti	$20,000	Lightning struck a house southwest of Cody along the South Fork of the Shoshone River. The lightning strike started a fire in the attic of the home, which caused extensive damage.
April 2026	Thunderstorm Wind	Wapiti	-	A 62 mph wind gust was reported to the southeast of Wapati.
May 2025	Thunderstorm Wind	Wapiti	-	A 65 mph wind gust was reported at Irma Lake.
May 2025	Thunderstorm Wind	Wapiti	-	A thunderstorm brought wind gusts as high as 79 mph at Irma Lake. A 61 mph wind gust was reported 9 miles SSE of Wapati.
August 2025	Thunderstorm Wind	Wapiti	-	Wind gusts as high was 64 mph were reported southeast of Wapiti.
June 2008	Flood	Wapiti	-	The North Fork of the Shoshone River crested around 8.5 feet about one-half foot above flood stage. This caused state park officials to sandbag a campground at Buffalo Bill State Park west of Cody. The flooding occurred during the early morning hours as snowmelt water from the previous day progressed downstream.
July 2002	Wildfire	Wapiti	-	no account filed
July 2001	Wildfire	Wapiti	-	no account filed
August 2001	Wildfire	Wapiti	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Park County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

1 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Photograph	Property	Distance	Listed
	UXU Ranch	5.0 miles	2003

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 66000759 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Park County	All 38 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.